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When comparing full frame sensors to APS-C size sensors with a variety of
lenses under a variety of shooting conditions, one thing is clear: Canon has
done an outstanding job in producing digital cameras that flat-out capture the
scene! The results with both the full-frame Canon 5D and the smaller-sensor
Canon 20D are excellent.

Working with a number of lenses on both full frame sensor and APS-C size
sensor cameras, there is no question about image quality—both sensor sizes
are capable of capturing high-quality photos.

In this final installment of my three-part series, I’ll address some
specific differences between shooting cameras with full frame sensors and
cameras with APS-C size sensors.

A Discussion of Methodology

For the purposes of this discussion, there are three ways to compare cameras
with different sensor sizes:

Shooting from the same location at the same focal length, capturing
different amounts of the scene

Shooting from the same location at different focal lengths to capture the
same amount of the scene

Shooting from different locations at the same focal length to capture the
same amount of the scene

In all these examples, the comparison images were taken using a tripod and a
cable release to minimize outside influences.

NOTE

All the images were captured as Raw and processed only for color and tonality
in Adobe Camera Raw. Sharpening, noise reduction, and Clarity were set to zero
to enable a comparison of sharpness and noise of the sensor/lens/focal length
combinations.